


In Perfect Understanding

by ygrainette



Category: The Musketeers (2014)
Genre: Canon Era, Established Relationship, F/F, Femslash Yuletide 2014, Fluff, Secret Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-26
Updated: 2014-12-26
Packaged: 2018-03-03 16:23:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2857280
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ygrainette/pseuds/ygrainette
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Queen of all France she may be, but Anne always feels a little … intimidated by the Comtesse de Larroque.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Perfect Understanding

**Author's Note:**

  * For [atheartagentleman](https://archiveofourown.org/users/atheartagentleman/gifts).



> Written for the [Femslash Yuletide](http://femslashyuletide.tumblr.com/) challenge day 8. I didn't finish it on time so posting it on day 26, the free day.  
> Theme: _Festive drinks_.
> 
> Takes place ... perhaps pre-S1? I don't even know.  
> This is for the magnificent [atheartagentleman](http://at-heart-a-gentleman.tumblr.com/) who is wholly responsible for my being in this fandom.  
> I [tumble](http://capricorn-child.tumblr.com) & enjoy feedback greatly.

Queen of all France she may be, but Anne always feels a little … intimidated by the Comtesse de Larroque. Anne is well-educated, yes, and cultured, as she surely must be, a Princess of the Blood and raised to be a Queen. And yet. And yet she knows she will never have the natural quicksilver flash of wit nor the vital spark of drive that the Comtesse possesses. Will never stop feeling like the gauche, gawky, ignorant little girl she once was, when she is in Ninon's presence.

Ladies-in-waiting flanking her, all a-rustle with skirts and lace and a-glimmer with jewels, Anne draws herself up, pulls on her queenly mask. The Comtesse's maid bobs her a respectful, head-bowed curtsey, and draws open the ornately carved dark wood door.

"Her Majesty, the Queen!"

Stepping over the threshold into the Comtesse's rooms is a little like stepping into another kingdom entire. Anne is enveloped in warmth – Ninon abhors the cold, always keeps her fires banked and roaring – in the crisp scent of books and ink, of cloves and ambergris from the pomanders Ninon favours. Anne has seen all the great courts of Christendom, and nowhere has she found a smell so uniquely intoxicating.

Nor, indeed, a woman.

"Your Majesty." The Comtesse is on her feet, red-blonde sunrise hair a river down over her shoulders, brilliant against the deep green of her winter dress. She drops into a deep curtsey, and rises, effortlessly elegant, at the lift of Anne's chin.

"My dear Comtesse." Anne sways forward to kiss her cheek, eyes fluttering closed as she inhales that smell – the same as the rooms and yet, better, deeper, underlaid with the rich soft musk that is peculiar to Ninon and Ninon alone. Headier than the finest wine.

The velveteen tips of Ninon's fingers are ghosts at Anne's collarbone, her waist. Her lips a tempting brush of smooth heat. She steps back, tosses her head just a little, her hair shimmering where the firelight catches it, and smiles, eyebrows arched. "I see you brought your own Musketeers – rather prettier than His Majesty's, are they not?"

Anne smiles, shakes her head as beside her Gabrielle and Adeline flutter, confused. "You shouldn't tease, Ninon."

The Comtesse makes a little moue with her rosebud lips. "My apologies, Your Majesty." Then, gesturing with one long-fingered hand at her rooms, the plush chaises longues and high-backed chairs arranged to face the fireplace, "Come, have a seat. I shall send for some mulled wine."

So tempting. So very tempting. At any other time, Ninon's chambers are apt to be a throng of young women, reading her books, playing her harpsichord, debating some matter of philosophy back and forth, all of them half in love with her and entirely in awe of her. Anne cannot blame them – heaven knows, she of all people understands the effect the Comtesse de Larroque can have – but still she is glad of their absence. Glad to have Ninon's undivided attention.

There is nothing Anne would love more than to stay. To sit on a chaise longue beside Ninon, drinking warm spiced wine and listening to her talk. Sometimes she thinks she would be content to do nothing else for the rest of her life but listen to Ninon's ideas and opinions and interpretations, bask in the warmth of her, face turned to the sun. Forget everything but this one woman.

But Anne is the Queen, and her life is not her own. "I'm afraid I cannot stay, my dear Comtesse. There is a meeting with the Cardinal I must –"

"Oh, hang the Cardinal," Ninon says, smiling the wickedest of her smiles, the one she smiles when she raises up on her elbows and looks up the bed at Anne, taken apart by her clever clever tongue. The smile that Anne cannot help but reflect back at her. "I have mulled wine, I have chestnuts for roasting, I have a simply exquisite new collection of poetry I must read to you – don't tell me you'd rather talk to that old goat. I don't believe you."

Anne looks down at her feet to hide her smile. To hide the humour in it, and the sadness beneath that. "Of course not, dear, but I must."

"I know, Anne." There's a hand on her shoulder, squeezing so very gently. "I know."

Ninon's voice is pitched low and intimate, soft as can be, and it's all Anne can do not to reach up and kiss her, full on the mouth, regardless of Adeline and Gabrielle's curious eyes on them. Press her face into the exquisite arch of Ninon's neck, hold her so tight she cannot breathe, kiss her until she loses all of that composure. Instead she looks at Ninon and smiles politely, asks, "Will you be at the banquet tonight, Comtesse?"

"But of course." Ninon lets her fingers trace down Anne's arm as she withdraws her hand. Her pale eyes are diamond-bright, fierce. "I would not miss it for the world."

"And perhaps," Anne says, heart beating fast and desperate in her breast at having that gaze – that intensity – that passion – directed at _her_ , "there will be time for drinks afterward?"

The Comtesse smiles, vivid as a midsummer sun, and Anne is in no doubt that Ninon knows _exactly_ what she meant by that. Of course she does. Ninon de Larroque is the most intelligent woman in France, the most learned, and besides, has seen Anne naked and wanton, all queenly reserve thrown to the winds, has loved her so deeply and so well that sometimes it feels like she has crept under Anne's skin, into her blood. She knows.

"I promise it, Your Majesty," she says.


End file.
